Sings the Caged Bird
by SilverFrame.BlackPhotograph
Summary: She doesn't know why, but she'll always remember the sound of his voice, the look in his eyes. Kirill/OFC
1. Chapter 1

Title: Sings the Caged Birds

Author:

Fandom: The Bourne Series

Characters: Kirill, OFC, Jason Bourne

Pairings: Kirill/OFC

Disclaimer: I don't own anything except Anastasiya.

Summary: A caged bird never trills a jubilant song, only one of despair and longing for what it knows is just byond the metal bars. Anastasiya is one bird among many trying to find her own song, and failing. She's locked in a world where the other birds have turned their tail feathers to her and she's alone.

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><p>When she was a little girl, her grandmother used to tell her, <em>God loved the birds and invented trees, Asya. Man loved the birds and invented cages. <em>Growing up, she never knew what her grandmother had meant and after a few years she never gave it another thought. But it occurs to her, on a cold, rainy day in London, so far from her homeland, what her grandmother might have been hinting towards. It comes to her suddenly, as if the knowledge itself is not quite sure whether she is ready or not to understand, and she agrees, maybe. She's not ready, but she remembers, all the same, about the day she began to learn what it meant to free a caged bird.

She remembers the first time she met him. It was dusk, in England, and cold. Not really cold, but enough that it was a bit uncomfortable. She was walking to her dorm, like every other evening, after a four hour rehearsal with her instructor. She was tired and her fingers hurt, more than they had in years. She remembers that she was maybe a bit sleepy, enough to lessen her awareness of her surroundings anyway. She tripped over an uneven cobblestone in the road and she fell onto the rough, wet pathway. Her face lit up in embarrassment when some of the other students heading the same way roared with laughter. They passed by her without a second look and didn't break from their tight-knit group. None of them stopped to help her. She was nineteen at the time, and alone: too old to fit in with the child prodigies at the Royal Academy of Music and too young to fit with the older, more experienced students. She had nowhere to go.

She did not right herself immediately but when she did small rocks that clung to the skin of her arms and the fabric of her jeans had to be brushed away. There was a new tear in her well-worn pants and fresh blood oozing from her palms alongside the dried from the hours of intense abuse to her fingers and wrists. She used the already somewhat stained fabric of her jeans to wipe the blood away and bent to retrieve her bag and case. She remembers the sudden impact of someone larger, stronger, than her colliding with her back, and being afraid of hitting the ground again, but she never did. A solid, though gentle, arm halted her fall. It was fast to slide around her waist and pull her upright against a firm chest and, for a moment, it was as if she was being held like someone's lover, warm and protected. But, as soon as she was righted, the arm disappeared and she was able to turn to face her savior. And she was awestruck. She still has no better words for her feelings that day.

He was taller than she was, she had to tilt her head to look him in the eye, and broad in the shoulders and thin at the waist. His hair was black and short and his eyes, she remembers his eyes the best. They were hazel, nothing special, but the way they looked at her, like some kind of warring knowledge lay behind them. They were stunning. His lips were set into a sullen frown, like he hadn't expected to run into her. Like he hadn't even seen her. She remembers that a broken thanks tumbled out of her mouth, her rough accent a little deeper and a little more slurred. He had blinked, as if he was surprised, but there was no other outward sign that he was anything but stoic. And he had opened his mouth and answered her in her native language; his voice is rough and unused, but is soft at the same time, almost like a whisper. She remembers him walking away, sliding, caressing, his fingers so lightly over her elbow that she maybe had imagined it, and his eyes had met hers and then he was gone.

She doesn't remember much after that, only one minute she was on the street and the next she was in her fourth story dorm room. She shed her jacket and her scarf and set her giant instrument case, bigger than she was and black and alive under her fingers, in the corner behind the door. She shuffled into the almost non-existent kitchen area and had fixed a cup of strong tea and had huddled up in the small window seat with a blanket and relatively new sheet music, though it had been bent and straightened and well-loved before; she had a performance in a few months and she had to make sure she was completely familiar with the piece.

But the longer she sat there, the longer she thought about what he had said.

"_Обережно__, пташка__."_

_Careful, little bird _

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><p><em>AN: This is diffrent from the teaser. there is a new paragraph and the others have been changed. _


	2. Chapter 2

Title: Sings the Caged Birds

Author:

Fandom: The Bourne Series

Characters: Kirill, OFC, Jason Bourne

Pairings: Kirill/OFC

Disclaimer: I don't own anything except Anastasiya.

Summary: She doesn't know why, but she'll always remember the sound of his voice, the look in his eyes.

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><p><em>Be as a bird perched on a frail branch that she feels bending beneath her, still she sings away all the same, knowing she has wings<em>. – Victor Hugo

The room around her was cramped, full of chairs and music stands nearly toppling over with use and a long line of oversight. But despite the mess and the clutter and the steady whirl of water flowing through pipes behind thin walls, she was calmed. The walls peeled antique blue paint and the ceiling was spotted with water damage. The one door to the room hung crooked on its hinges; its brass knob was tarnished with neglect. The carpet was missing in some places, allowing the rotting hardwood below to peak through and glimpse its first glance of light in decades. There were no windows, though if there were she assumed that they would be in the same state of disuse and omission.

The chairs in the room, hundreds it seemed like, were broken and chipped and water damage had begun to rot them through in some places. They were stacked and heaped and thrown about at odd angles with no sense or direction. Some were missing backs, others legs, and some could barely be called chairs anymore for the lack of shape they held. But despite the seemingly chaos of the room, she knew there was order. Disheveled and chaotic order, but order none-the-less. The oldest chairs, black oak with a rosy finish, used to be performance chairs on the main conservatory stage, three and a half stories above her head, and were thrown into the furthest corner from the door. After the black chairs came light browns, dark browns, greens, reds, and a very few that were a strange shade of rustic orange. And on the very top, the most recent, were broken black plastic chairs that just never made it to the garbage.

There was a lone unblemished music stand in the room, just next to a box in which she knew were copies of every musical piece she had ever had the pleasure of playing. In front of the stand was the one solid, unmarred chair in the room. It was wood, she didn't know what kind, and had once been black as a country night sky, but was now fading to a well-loved, warm grey. She approached the chair, her chair, dragging her heavy black case behind her. She fell into the familiar grooves of the wood, set her case on the ground to her side, and reached into the beat up metal box of music. She flipped through several sheets, some single pieces and others page upon page, and finally pulled several frayed and yellowed sheets from the mess.

She set them carefully on the music stand, almost like, if she was too harsh with them, they would fall to pieces between her fingers. Once the paper was settled in the right order, she reached for the large black case that she carried everywhere she went. It was taller than she was, and twice if not three times as wide, and the black leather was worn in places, but obviously well-loved and cared for. Despite the raging cold outside the leather was warm and familiar and alive under her fingers and she loved it like a mother her child. The brass latches were tarnished, but bright and lush with love and admiration for its tender caregiver. The two handles, one towards the neck and the other the base, had been replaced several times, though the case didn't begrudge her that. It was loyal to a fault.

When the latches flipped back and the leather womb gave birth, like it had time and time before, to the beautiful creation her fingers worshiped, she smiled. The instrument inside was a rich, medium brown that showed care and love had been thrust upon it. The strings were taunt and almost seemed to vibrate on their own. Ebony fitting clung to the neck like a lover's embrace. She grasped the throat of her like-child and raised it up on its one, thin foot. Her fingers graced over the fingerboard, and the strings and she rested her face against the cool wood, almost like she couldn't believe that it was within her grasp. It was a child and, without her guidance, had no path in life but to sit and collect dust. The next to be freed from its prison was the bow, long and fierce in her fingers.

Holding her child to her body, she slid the case out from under her feet and set her cello on the worn carpet. She sat as straight as she could and felt herself slide into a familiar balance. Her left hand and fingers found the rough strings and fingerboard without thought and her bow settled in her grip. When she finally, finally, struck the first note, it was like magic. It was warm and rich and it pulled on her heartstrings. (1. This piece I'm mentioning is 'The Secret' by Adam Hurst.)

Her fingers coasted over the strings, like fog over the windless, waveless, sea, and plucked sound from the very heart of the thing. Around her the chairs listened, and even the walls, with their water stains and peeling paint, were quiet with bated breath at each pause of her hand. The floor under her feet pulsed with the unseen beat of her heart. It was all she needed from life, only this as her nourishment and reason for living. Without it, she knew, she would be a waste to the world; one with that aching desire that so craved something that was missing. Without this, she would wander the earth and never feel whole.

With one final pause, silence where resonance once was, a knocking came from the crooked door, three hollow, despairing reverberations. She turned in her chair, and her fingers dropped from their cradle and the bow rested against her knee, and she knew her calming time was done with. Foregoing acknowledgement, the door swung open on its creaking hinges and in the busted, fractured frame stood the only man with whom she could truly acquaint.

He was rather short, and on the broader side, though he was by no means a large man. His legs were stocky, as well as his arms, and, in complete contrast, his fingers and hands were slim and long, perfect for the career he was so impassioned to. He wore pressed black pants and professionally shined shoes. His vest was of the blackest velvet and his shirt was pearly and starched so she imagined it was quite uncomfortable. A short beard rested on his chin and flowed up into a mustache. Despite the trimmed and well-kept facial hair, long strands and tangles of ivory frosted hair hung in disarray from his head. The strands were loose and often ended up being pushed from one side to the other and out of archaic blue eyes. The skin on his face was rough and weathered from the habitual weather outside and his nose was made even more prominent by the pock-marked red against the customary paleness of his complexion. All-in-all, he stood as a rather imposing figure that was both comfort and dread to anyone familiar with him.

Anastasiya looked at him sadly and spoke quietly, as if she were afraid to break the quiet sanctity of the place,

"I am out of time, am I not?"

Her Russian was broken and spoken harshly, despite the ancestry her homeland shared with the great motherland of Russia, as she had yet to get used to the ups and downs of the language. She rarely bothered anymore; her fingers spoke the only language she ever wished to know.

"You are," he agreed.

His voice was as rough and weathered as the skin stretched over his cheekbones, and when he spoke, he inhaled, as if preparing his lungs for a great burst of sound.

"I was afraid of such," Anastasiya sighed.

The man nodded, a brief dip of his head, and he ushered her out of her chair. Regardless of the rush that seemed to course through his veins, Anastasiya took her time opening the black leather case and nesting her child back in its cradle. With a final sigh and flip of the latch, she stood and gathered her practice music off of the stand and into the damaged metal box at her feet. With resignation towards what was to come, she picked up her cherished instrument and followed the man, the maestro, through abandoned and leaking hallways and up one and a half flights of tumbling, swaying, drooping stairs to the refined and guilded hallways of the ever preforming Moscow Conservatory.

Gentle and firm hands guided her into a room filled with a dozen or so other women, young and aging, but all rushing to add that last perfect touch to hair or makeup or dress, and forcefully swept away with her beloved cello. She knew better than to protest, as it had been proven time and time before that she would not win any argument with her teacher. Abandoned by the man, she was hastened through the room, between women in varying stages of dress, to the back wall by a friendly, overzealous blonde woman, who pressed an opaque bag into her hands and insisted that she hurry to dress.

Alone, though far from calm, in the bathroom, Anastasiya took a deep breath and exhaled slowly. She hung the long, foreboding bag from a hook on the back of the door and gathered her wits about her. The tile around her was white, though it was far from the pristine color it used to be years before its use, and the walls were a calming shade of green, which contrasted with the black sink and toilet tucked into the corner opposite the door. She turned back to the bag and, with child-like fear and apprehension, took the zipper between the tips of her trembling fingers and pulled.

Slowly, oh so slowly, a gown the color of the ocean in the time after the sun has disappeared behind the horizon, but before all remaining light is gone, appeared from its confines and rippled to the cold tile floor. With hindrance of time, Anastasiya shed her clothes, her jacket and shirt then her pants and small, delicate boots, and was soon hardly more covered than when she had first arrived into the world.

The dress slipped easily off of the hangar, silky and lustrous over her rough calloused hands, and over her body, never once resisting or completely complying; it merely fell into its shape over her skin, like a river taking shape over the land. And, in spite of the fear quaking in her stomach and the ants crawling through her veins, she had to admit that she did look nice. Maybe not beautiful, she never saw herself as such, but definitely nicer than she cared for. She took in her clothes, puddled and strewn across the floor, and let them lay as they had fallen; she would merely adorn them again at the end of the night and she had no wish to fold them right then.

Before she realized it, the blonde woman that had given her the dress, Galiya, she thought her name was, was pulling her from the cold tiles and onto the familiar hardwood floors of the women's preparation area. Galiya sat her down, almost dropping her into the cushioned seat, and began to coax her long, copper and mahogany colored hair into a simple tail at the back of her head. Assuming that the nice, though rather straight forward woman was done, Anastasiya didn't expect a brush laden with gloss to be set against her lips. Fortunately, Galiya apparently knew of her strange dislike of heavy colors on her face, as the gloss was a nude color, and merely highlighted the cupid's bow shape of her mouth.

Finally, finally done, Anastasiya took her leave from the still bustling room and traipsed down one of several back hallways behind the main stage. The hallway, strangely empty but for a few men carrying larger instruments, was much like the room she had just left; the walls were the same mute yellow color, and the floors had the same rosy finish slathered on them. At the end of the hallway, and rather abruptly, the hardwood ended and gave way to a solid steel plate that matched the single, just as solid, steel door above it. Through that doorway was the stage, the beginning of the night and several more to come, if she was lucky enough for such a wish to be granted.

The metal under her hands was cold, a stark contrast to the temperature of the air around her, as she pushed the door open quietly. The floor beyond, and the walls as well, were as black as the city night sky, void of all stars and moonlight. The immense, heavy velvet curtain was still in place, as it would stay until the final moments before everything began. Men in clothes just as black as the enclosure around them scurried to place things just so and alleviate what stress they could from the man standing amid them. He directed the placement of chairs and music stands in a half moon shape around the main stage, each chair set in a way that whoever should take their place there would be at their most comfortable.

She closed her eyes and listened and, just barely beyond the heavy curtain, could hear the quiet stirrings of people arriving to take their own seats for the performance. People, she suspected, that were dressed in their finest, to which she could not compare, and were used to such frivolities as silk and fine dining; people that had not had to work for much in their overly extravagant lives. To assure herself of such assumptions, Anastasiya tip-toed across the cold black laminate floor to the edge of even finer hardwood and the hem of the curtain. Swiftly and subtly, she swept a portion of the curtain away and gazed out into the dimly lit gathering crowd. She closed the gap between curtain and wall as quickly as she had separated them, the idea in her mind cinched.

A hard, delicate hand fell onto her shoulder, and she flinched away from the contact to her bare shoulder. The hand kept firm though, and told her that the body on the other end of the extremity must have been her teacher, Anton Gavriil; no one else would touch her with such familiarity. She looked up into his cornflower blue eyes then bowed her head. He ushered her back into the hallway from which she came with firm instructions to occupy herself until the time came that she would take the stage. But, like the moments before every other performance, she only walked the halls, a ghost amongst the hustle and haste put forth by other members of the orchestra.

Eventually she found herself back at the metal door. The halls had been vacated minutes before in the last rush before curtain call and the musician found herself almost lonely for the noise and presence of the other performers. She took a deep breath, not ready to face her fears, never ready to face her fears, and pushed the heavy door open.

Arranged in a half moon, sitting on the edges of their seats like children waiting for a treat, was the entire orchestra. The woodwinds, flute, clarinet, saxophone, sat nearer to Director Gavriil, and the brass sat, sousaphone, trombone, baritone, towards the back. An array of other instruments were sprinkled between them and sat just as ready. A single chair sat closer to the edge of the stage, to the right of the conductor, and Anastasiya recognized it as her chair from the basement, worn and faded, but still strong and stable. Her bourbon colored child sat on a stand next to the chair. Her bow, long and slender, lay diagonally across the seat of her chair.

For once in her life, she hesitated to take that seat, and was reminded why only seconds after her arrival to the stage. Nausea crept up from the darkest reaches of her stomach and overwhelmed her. She flew from the stage, like a bird escaping from its cage, and back to the women's dressing room, wholly unaware of the sound of footsteps following her. The carpet of the room gave way to chilling tile under her bare feet as she found herself back in the bathroom, knelt over the toilet and dry heaving, as nothing had entered her body due to nerves for two days.

When the violent churning sea that was the nausea in her stomach finally stopped, Anastasiya felt a cool rag pressed to her cheek and a hand help her off the floor. Just as quickly, the coolness left her skin and a dry cloth was pressed in its place, stealing the seeping chill left by the water. Quiet mutterings filled her ears, harsh Slavic words that held no meaning to her, and a finger tapped her nose. When she opened her eyes, a dark sense of anxiety washed over her, and she knew that if she tried to go back to her chair, she would fail, again and again.

Her teacher, who had followed her from the stage, tapped her nose again, to gain her attention, and said,

"You must not run away this time, Anastasiya. It is now that you must do this."

He spoke in broken English, a language she understood more clearly than Russian, and looked her in the eye to impress his meaning upon her.

"I cannot," she whispered.

"You can," he insisted. "You did so in England, in front of more people than will look upon you this night. What make this so different? Why was England so easy for you?"

Anastasiya's thoughts flashed back to those glimpsed hazel eyes, the set of his shoulders, the way his lips wrapped around her native language. The brush of his hand on her arm. She felt her cheeks heating in a blush and she said,

"I do not know. Something was just, different. It was strange, like nothing could touch me as long as I was on that stage."

"Remember that feeling!" he urged. "That is the feeling that will calm your nerves. When you look out at the crowd tonight, remember: you are invincible. You are above them all. You are a musician, and they are only here to hear you play!

She nodded, still unsure of how things would go if she tried again. He gave her his arm, and she took it in her delicate hand, and he escorted her back to the stage door. He paused, before he pushed the big metal slab open, and felt Anastasiya take a deep breath. When the grip on his arm relaxed, just a fraction, he shouldered the door open and marched onto the stage and up to his podium, leaving the cellist just behind the edge of the curtain.

"Ladies and gentlemen, my I present to you Anastasiya Aleksandra Krajnik: the Conservatory's most prized soloist."

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><p>Hey! Leave me some reviews cause they equal love! I promise the next chapter will have Kirill in it!<p> 


	3. Chapter 3

Title: Sings the Caged Birds

Author:

Fandom: The Bourne Series

Characters: Kirill, OFC, Jason Bourne

Pairings: Kirill/OFC

Disclaimer: I don't own anything except Anastasiya.

Summary: She doesn't know why, but she'll always remember the sound of his voice, the look in his eyes.

A/N: This is the prologue from Kirill's point of view. The next chapter, the third, will be Kirill's point of view of the second chapter, but after that they won't be separated anymore; it'll just be from Anastasiya's view of the story. AND, if you don't know this yet, on my profile is a link to my account. There you can find images of Anastasiya's cello, dress, the Conservatory, and other places that will be important later on. I share the account with my best friend, WhyIsARavenLikeAWritingDesk, so she'll have some things there too, but everything is labeled, so you shouldn't have any trouble finding it. Toodles ;)

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><p><em>Birds sing after a storm; why shouldn't people feel as free to delight in whatever sunlight remains to them? – Rose Kennedy<em>

He remembers her. It's nothing extraordinary, really; he remembers everyone he's ever met. It's why he's so good at his job. He's in London and he catches sight of her three blocks away. He's just completed a job and is taking a final walk to stretch his legs before his flight back to Russia. They're walking towards each other, feet grinding against cobbled paths, shoes slippery in the wet. He remembers that she walked as if some weight pressed down on her shoulders, as if that weight was the world itself, but continues on without pause. Her long, dark hair is stringy and damp, and he supposes she had gotten caught in the earlier showers, but her skin is practically glowing, if he could come up with no better words that cliché.

She's pulling some kind of enormous, black case behind her, and, by the shape of it, he wagers that it's some kind of instrument. There is a groups of what seems to be students walking just behind her and when she stumbles, falls to her knees, skin breaking as is clashes with the rough stone beneath her, they don't stop to help. They laugh and jest and he knows what that's like, to watch the world around him gather and group and leave him all alone. By the time he's come to this realization he's only half a block away, close enough to see the blue of her eyes and the blood on her palms. She's smaller than he realized at first; not short, necessarily, but thin, dainty. _Sick_, his mind breaths. And it's right. Despite the glow of her skin there are blue smears under her eyes and a restlessness about her.

And then, without his permission, his body is moving into hers, a light impact that might cause a bit of unbalance, but no harm. His hand reaches out to study her, his fingers brushing over the warm, undamaged skin of her forearm. She looks up at him with such surprise in her eyes, in the lines of her face, that it's almost laughable. A broken thanks fumble from her mouth, voice deep and melodic and harsh with words, a tongue clearly not used to the strange up and down of the English language. He recognizes that tongue, responds in kind and is rewarded with more blatant surprise flashing over her visage.

But then he's gone, feet moving, mind aware of every possible danger. Blocks away, lifetimes away, he's back in his hotel room and he wonders at the tingling in his fingertips that hasn't left yet.

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><p>Reviews are physical (well, virtual) love!<p> 


	4. Chapter 4

Title: Sings the Caged Birds

Author:

Fandom: The Bourne Series

Characters: Kirill, OFC, Jason Bourne

Pairings: Kirill/OFC

Disclaimer: I don't own anything except Anastasiya.

Summary: She doesn't know why, but she'll always remember the sound of his voice, the look in his eyes.

Author's Note: Just mentioning it again, but you can find the link to the pictures that relate to this story on my profile.

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><p><em>How helpless we are, like netted birds, when we are caught by desire. – Belva Plain<em>

Abram Kruschev was a balding man, round and plump and a prime example of a cushy, well-funded lifestyle. His hands were soft, shaking hands and kissing ass didn't call for any physical calluses, and he sat more than he stood. The mustache, full and thick unlike the bare spots on his crown, on his face was patchy with grey and the occasional white, but he wore it with pride. His belly protruded over his belt by at least five inches, but he never slowed in the rich foods he consumed. He wore expensive suits and appreciated the occasional cigar, despite the protest of his wife. All of this was afforded, some of it under the table, by the luck the man had come upon when he invested with Yuri Gretkov at just the right time. Gretkov has since tolerated the man.

His wife was a horse-like woman with a long face and thin limbs. She was thick in the middle, as she participated in the same richly fed lifestyle as her husband, and was more than willing to show off her numerous, misplaced curves with the fine silk dresses she liked to drape over her chunky frame as if the expensive cloth would make up for the lifetime of miscare she supplied her body with. Unlike her husband, her head was full of spry, flyaway hair in an odd, corn silk color that did not match the rest of her and was clearly fake. The woman never took part in any business with Gretkov, like her husband had, but was a constant nuisance to life in general; it was a rare occasion when she did not interrupt a meeting for the sake of scolding her husband for having excess gravy the night before, or some such foolishness.

They were dressed as impeccably as ever, Abram in a tux and a silk bowtie and his wife in a pasty green silk gown that did anything but flatter, the night that Kirill accompanied them to the Moscow Conservatory. Gretkov had played him off as a mere body guard, as you can never be too careful these days, he had reasoned, and wanted them ended by the end of the night. Kruschev, as one of Gretkov's investors, had been sticking his nose in where the oil mogul didn't want it and had decided that the man, and his very minor fortune, were simply disposable; that he could just as easily rid himself of the pest as draw in a new, more wealthy patron. Kirill had not argued, it was not his place, but he could have done without the trip to the Conservatory.

The Conservatory itself was a large building, one of the many that had seen numerous expansions over the years, and was painted a soft yellow color that blended with the other colorful buildings around it. Kirill figured it had something to do with the art district of the city, but did not dwell on it. There was a sizable crowd present, but nothing he couldn't handle; it was nothing like the crowds he had dealt with in Paris, Sofia, Rome. He supposed that there would have been more people, had the opening night not been a closed event. He recognized several people, some of the elite social class that made it their jobs to be seen and carry influence, but he was positive that none of them realized who he was, if they even knew to begin with. The walls of the entrance hall were the same soft yellow as the outside, and the carpet was a deep green interwound with ivory lace patterns. The farthest limits of the narrow room were lined with glass display cases; each filled with momentous and informative plaques dedicated to whichever artist it was assigned.

He walked behind the Kruschevs, pretending to be the formidable, but bored, bodyguard. His hands were deep in the pockets of his suit, feeling the familiar, grooved grip of the Walther P99 that never left his side. The couple meandered through the crowd, going from this group to that and making their presence known. The other socialites greeted them politely, but Kirill could see the tensions in their bodies. It was quite obvious, at least to him, that the only reason the Kruschevs were tolerated was to protect self-image; none of the high class present wanted to show their asses in public to tell the man and his wife to go to hell. Kirill was pretty sure that if someone didn't do it soon, then he would before the night was over.

Kruschev finally led his wife into the main observatory, a large, two story, horseshoe shaped room. The walls were, again, the same soft yellow with ivory trim, and the carpet was the same deep green with lace patterns on the edges. The chairs in the room, armless and with their overstuffed cushions, were the same shade as the carpet, though they were missing the ivory accents. The Kruschevs took the stairs to the balcony that rounded as the room did, and took their seats in one of the arms of the horseshoe, Kirill manning his position behind them. It wasn't long before the rest of the crowd filtered in, taking their seats and saying the last of their meaningless chatter.

Kirill let his eyes flicker to the stage on the ground floor and, though his eyes didn't stay there long, he could just sense the quiet hustle and bustle going on behind the heavy emerald curtain. Feet thumped against hardwood floors, and then everything stopped, except two sets of footsteps growing quieter; someone had left the stage, at quiet a fast pace, and someone else had followed. But, when the curtain finally rose, no one seemed to be missing, except for the single empty chair set away from the others. A large, well-cared-for cello rested against a stand next to the chair and the bow was laid across the seat of the chair. But then Kirill was distracted from the chair when a stocky man, with wild white hair and red face, raised his hand to ask for silence from the specters.

"Ladies and gentlemen, my I present to you Anastasiya Aleksandra Krajnik: the Conservatory's most prized soloist."

There was a pause, and the "bodyguard" felt the tension and expectation rise in the room, before it was violently broken. He didn't know exactly what he expected, but the young woman that stepped out from behind the now open curtain was not it. It seemed that the rest of the crowd felt the same, as her appearance sent a wave of shocked whispers through the observatory. She was beautiful, he would give her that. Her skin was pale, and her lips red, as if she had bitten them just before coming on stage, and her eyes were a shock of blue that he could see even from this distance and the longer he looked at her, the more it felt like he had met her once before, if only briefly. Then, like a puzzle falling into place, it clicked; this was the same young woman he had run into, literally and purposely, on that street in London three years ago.

She hadn't changed much, save for her attire. Her posture still spoke of nervousness, of shyness, and she still seemed to have the weight of the world upon her shoulders. But then she sat in the singular chair and her entire demeanor changed; her posture straightened and became firm, as if to take a stand against a foe, and her hands caressed the bow between her fingers and she gently, like cradling a child, pulled the warm colored cello towards her chest. She was a completely different person. The hem of her dress pulled from the floor as she adjusted her position and he was amused to find that, for all the grandeur of the dress she wore and that of the other orchestra members, she was barefoot.

He forced his eyes away from the young woman and the stage; he couldn't become distracted, even in the middle of such a mediocre job. There were few others in the balcony with the Kruschevs and they sat at least several rows away. Below, there wasn't an empty seat between the entrance and the stage; the place truly was packed. Kirill, in an act so unlike him, turned his attention back to the stage to the woman, and could not bring him to move his eyes away. It was as if something had bewitched him and there was nothing he could do, or was really willing, to do. The conductor spoke again, but Kirill missed the words, too enraptured by the movement of her fingers over the neck of the cello, the wisp of the dress around her ankles. There was nothing about her that wasn't interesting in some way.

Soon after that thought passed over him, the assassin berated himself; he had never been one for romantic notions, or infatuations, and now was no time to start. But, try as me might, his eyes fell back to her after every sweep of the room. The crowd stilled, something that he did not miss, and the conductor raised his arms and the orchestra moved as one. The only still person on stage was her, the cellist. But then the brass quieted, and the percussion dulled to a dull, faint pulse, and the only thing alive on the stage was her: Anastasiya. The music* was teeming with life and he could almost see the dancers that the piece must have been written for. It was foreign, and completely different from anything he's heard during his travels, despite venturing the world.

And then it was over. The Kruschevs were on their feet, applauding as if they alone could be heard, and Kirill had to wonder if the entire night would continue on like this. His eyes swept the balcony, then the floor below them, and he knew with an aching certainty that, if someone had wanted, he would have been dead. He couldn't afford such a distraction, not in the world he belonged to, and he was lucky that this wasn't a real job; this was merely taking about the garbage. But the simplicity of the job didn't matter. Distraction did.

The same sequence of events, the music, the applauding, the silence, cycled three times before the conductor dismissed the orchestra. Kirill found himself minutely disappointed as the young woman was the first to rush off of the stage. He had wanted to observe her for a while longer.

The crowd thinned quickly, but despite that, the Kruschevs stayed behind and lingered until the lights began to dim and they were politely ushered to the door. A car awaited them, plain, black, non-descript, with a driver to open the door for the already lazy couple. Kirill took the passenger seat next to the driver as the other man closed the door and began the route back to the Kruschevs' townhome. The drive through Moscow itself was quiet, broken only by the somewhat loud breathing of the soon to be ex patrons. Kirill hadn't expected it when Kruschev spoke to him; the entire night both of them had acted like he didn't exist.

"So how was your first experience at the Conservatory, Dmitrii?"

"It was not my first experience, sir," Kirill said blandly.

He hated this part of the job, having to play along to whatever Gretkov had said; he would much rather end the job now and count the driver as collateral damage.

"Oh? Yuri said you did not get out much, all work and no play."

"No, sir. I have been going to the Conservatory for years. It was a nice surprise to see Ms. Krajnik on her debut night."

"Ah, you know the young lady!" his wife said excitedly.

"Yes, ma'am. For many years," he agreed.

"How exciting!"

"What is she like?" Kruschev asked.

"She is very shy," Kirill said, though he has no idea if it is true or not; it will not matter when the night it over.

"Oh, but she's very wonderful," the woman said.

The rest of the ride through Moscow was silent, and Kirill thanked whoever was listening for it. He knew he would not be able to make it back to the townhouse if they had kept rambling.

o0o

When Kirill was back in his apartment, the perimeter secured and his space exactly as he left it, all his weapons accounted for, the man let himself relax for the span of a breath and think about what had transpired. He had not expected to see the young woman again, to know her name, and he was somewhat relieved that he did. But that only made him question. Why was he relieved? Why was knowing her name so important, when he had all but forgotten her existence? He found himself abandoning his perch on the sill of a window and pouring a generous amount of bourbon into a glass. It wasn't often that Kirill let himself drink, it provided too much of a relapse of his reflexes and he knew that too much too often could be suicide, _was_ suicide. But he would allow it this once.

* * *

><p>*The link to the music piece that I am referring to here can be found on my profile.<p> 


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